Kolkata: Former Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee passed away on Monday. He was 89.
Chatterjee was put on ventilator support after he suffered a mild heart attack on Sunday night.
Last month, the 10-time Lok Sabha member and Communist Party of India (Marxist) veteran had suffered a hemorrhagic stroke. After undergoing treatment for 40 days, he was discharged from the hospital. However, his condition deteriorated last Tuesday and he had to be hospitalised again.
Chatterjee was a central committee member of the CPI(M), which he had joined in 1968.
He was the Speaker of the Lok Sabha from 2004 to 2009. The veteran leader was, however, expelled from the CPI(M) in 2008 after he refused to step down as the Speaker after his party withdrew support to Manmohan Singh-led UPA- 1 government over the Indo-US nuclear deal.